GOREE ISLAND, Senegal (AP) — President Barack Obama is calling his visit to a Senegalese island, from which Africans were said to have been shipped across the Atlantic Ocean into slavery, a “very powerful moment.”

Obama says visiting Goree Island on Thursday with his wife, Michelle, and daughters helps them fully appreciate the magnitude of the slave trade.

Obama also said that, as an African American and an African-American president, the trip gives him even greater motivation to stand up for human rights around the world. He said the island is a reminder of what happens when those rights aren’t protected.

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